söndag 8 Apr 2007, 4:18

When I was in 8th grade Spanish class, our teacher (who I'll admit right now I had a crush on) would give us sheets of paper that had song lyrics with selected words whited out, then play the song for us, and we were supposed to id the words and write them down. One was a song whose title I can't remember by a band I want to say was named Amantes Peligrosos… and one was Estoy Aqui, which is how I became aware of Shakira.

So, junior year of high school (which is when my fluency in Spanish peaked), I bought Dónde están los ladrones?. Which is an excellent album. There's some really great songs on it, and even the ones that aren't great are more entertaining, in my opinion, than anything on Pies descalzos except the title track and "Estoy Aqui".

Then in my senior year of high school, she released Laundry Service. And it was… pretty bad. And her more recent stuff's been even worse.

When she switched to singing in English, which I'd say corresponded to a stylistic shift from rock singer/songwriter (work with similarities to John Mellencamp and Melissa Etheridge) to overexposed pop (do I have to name 'em?), she threw away a lot of her musical quality. Hips Don't Lie hurts my ears and induces violent lunges to turn off the radio. But I like Octavo Día and Si Te Vas.

See, once upon a time, Shakira made good music. Then she sold out, started singing in English, and let her hips overshadow her guitar.